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I am Professor and Chair of the Department of Political Science and Public Administration at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. I am also the editor of the academic journal The Latin Americanist.

Sunday, November 15, 2009

Mel Zelaya wrote a letter to President Obama saying the talks were dead and that he would not accept an agreement that returns him to the presidency if it entails any recognition of the coup. I should point out that he read this letter in Spanish on the radio, which was then picked up, translated and excerpted, so the exact wording can easily get lost along the way.

Unless something changes drastically (and as we've seen, that certainly can happen) the Obama administration has decided that the coup was acceptable and there is no need to do anything about it. The Micheletti government violated the agreement, and what appeared to be a breakthrough was all window dressing.

A extremely depressing conclusion is that Senator Jim DeMint is a point man for Obama's Latin America policy. This victory will bring him even more front and center in next year's immigration debate.

Days since the coup: 140Days until the scheduled presidential election: 14

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comments:

Panama has also announced they will recognize the elections. I'm sure other countries will follow.

I suspect that many countries are tired of Zelaya's antics and more and more have come to realize that Zelaya himself is the main culprit of this mess.

It's hard to know of course, but I doubt DeMint is an arquitect of Latin America policy. From the beginning the US was a bit ambivalent about how to deal with Zelaya. And it's been clear for some time that the elections were the best way to solve this.

I agree with Anon 10:11. Zelaya was the problem from the beginning and the majority of Hondurans understood that, luckily.

As well, from the beginning, the Obama administration saw this as a no-win situation for them, with the elections being the best way out. My guess is that Zelaya followers will attempt to initimidate folks from voting, but there will be a big turn-out for the event. I've volunteered to be an observer at the elections, so it should be interesting...

Leftside will gladly tell you that I believe that he is a rank ideologue and a notorious apologist for the Castro regime.

There is no love lost between me and Justin Delacour.

That being said, you have persistently refused to acknowledge the brutal human rights abuses of the military and police under the Micheletti regime. For example, Amnesty International published this report (pdf file) which counted amongst its allegations the following:

Some of the female detainees and witnesses said that women had been touched in a sexual way as they were prodded with truncheons by police while lying on the ground under arrest. All those who were interviewed said they had been beaten on the buttocks and backs of the legs.

One woman told Amnesty International that when she was detained she had been asked by a policeman “why aren’t you at home having sex with your husband?”

A 34- year- old woman, L., who had been beaten by police at the same demonstration, but not detained by the police, told Amnesty international how she had always believed “The police are here to protect us, not to harm us” and that she was shocked and traumatized at the violence that she and her 59-year-old mother had experienced at the hands of the police during the break up of the protest. L. and her mother were repeatedly beaten by police using batons, across the back of the thighs and buttocks. L also told Amnesty international that the police shoved the baton down her blouse. The policeman said to her “if this [demonstrating] is what you’re up to, well this is what you’re going to deserve.” L told how her mother had attempted to cover herself with a piece of clothing and the police officer shouted “This cloth isn’t going to save you”.

This is the side you have allied yourself with and this is just the tip of the iceberg.

So if you choose to accuse Al Giordano of being biased towards Zelaya, your ignoring of the Micheletti regime's documented human rights abuses, while accusing Zelaya's suppoorters of fomenting violence for the future, puts you in a glass house with a stone in your hand.